WRITTEN QUESTION No. 2484/96 by Hiltrud BREYER to the Commission. Use of Avoparcin for fattening
Date: 1996-09-25
Institutions: BREYER, European Parliament
Subjects: animal feedingstuffs, cattle, consumer protection, dangerous substance, fattening, food additive, food inspection, health control, livestock, veterinary inspection













EUR-Lex - 91996E2484 - EN






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91996E2484

WRITTEN QUESTION No. 2484/96 by Hiltrud BREYER to the Commission. Use of Avoparcin for fattening  


Official Journal C 105 , 03/04/1997 P. 0009 





WRITTEN QUESTION E-2484/96 by Hiltrud Breyer (V) to the Commission (25 September 1996)Subject: Use of Avoparcin for fatteningThe use of Avoparcin to fatten animals is now prohibited in five Member States.1. Can the Commission say how these countries deal with meat imports from the internal market which are contaminated by Avoparcin?2. Can it be safely assumed in the countries in question that meat is free of Avoparcin?If so, how is the above guarantee provided?If not, does the Commission know how such a guarantee is to be provided in the future?Answer given by Mr Fischler on behalf of the Commission (13 November 1996)1. If meat were found to contain avoparcin residues the health control authorities would be quite within their rights to seize the meat and withdraw it from the market, whether in a Member State authorising the use of avoparcin as an animal feedingstuff additive or in a Member State banning it.However, that situation seems highly unlikely for, as was stated by the Scientific Committee for Animal Nutrition in its report in June 1983 (('Report of the Scientific Committee for Animal Nutrition on the use of avoparcin in feedingstuffs for calves and fattening cattle', in Reports of the Scientific Committee for Animal Nutrition, Fourth Series, Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities. Report EUR 8769, cat. No CD-NK-83-010-EN-C, pp. 120-129.)), 'avoparcin added to feed was virtually unabsorbed by the digestive system of rats, chickens and pigs and [that its use in feed for chickens and pigs] does not produce any detectable residues in the tissue'. Studies performed on calves, steers and bulls under the proposed conditions and at higher doses and with the use of molecules labelled with 14C lead to the same conclusions. The conclusion of the Committee on the residue aspect in that report was that 'since the proposed use of avoparcin does not cause detectable residues in edible products, they do not entail any risk for the consumer'. More recently, the Committee confirmed those findings in its report of 29 September 1994, reconfirmed on 24 March 1995, on the use of avoparcin in feed for dairy cows ((Report not yet published.)).2. To guarantee that meat does not and will not contain residues Member States are obliged to carry out the following checks:- for animal feedingstuffs, to confirm compliance with the provisions of Directive 70/524/EEC on additives in animal feed ((OJ L 270, 14.12.1970.)), use of the official agar diffusion method (Directive 81/715/EEC ((OJ L 257, 10.9.1981.)));- for meat, microbiological or thin-layer chromatography (TLC) methods which can reveal the presence of avoparcin residues.